The three missing women: Marina Pérez Ríos, Maritza Pérez Ríos and Dora Alicia Cervantes.RR SS
The last day they were heard was February 25th. Since then, there has been no information about the whereabouts of Americans Maritza and Marina Pérez Ríos, as well as Dora Alicia Cervantes Sáenz. Nuevo León prosecutors have confirmed that the women’s trail was lost as they traveled in a truck from China to Montemorelos, both municipalities of that Mexican state. The women had come over from Texas the day before. In those two weeks with no news, four other US citizens went missing in Tamaulipas and the media clamor over their kidnapping made it possible to locate them in record time – two of them were already dead. However, no progress was made in finding the three women.
The Pérez Ríos sisters and their friend Dora Alicia Cervantes, residents of Peñitas, a small town near McAllen in the United States, traveled to Mexico to sell clothes at a market, according to Peñitas Police Chief Roel Bermea. The agent explained that it was the husband of one of the women who filed the missing persons report on February 27 after being unable to contact his wife throughout the weekend.
The 47, 48 and 53-year-old women were driving a green Chevy Silverado toward the town of Montemorelos, about a three-hour drive from the border. The searches are also being carried out in collaboration with the Tamaulipas Public Prosecutor’s Office as the disappearance area borders between the two states. However, a spokesman for the Neo-Leonese agency has indicated that there is “no official cooperation with the FBI” at the moment. Prosecutors explain why the FBI “did not intervene informally” that the three missing women lived in the United States but were not born there. The embassy has claimed knowledge of the disappearance of three Americans but says it has no further information at this time.
The alleged distance that the women wanted to cover hardly exceeds 200 kilometers. Peñitas is practically on the border with Mexico. Customs officials have confirmed that the three Americans crossed on the 24th and, according to initial information, have arrived in China, some 120 kilometers from their place of origin. It’s on the road from there to Montemorelos where they lose track.
The Nuevo León Public Prosecutor’s Office has confirmed that searches for the women are ongoing and that the area has been checked with drones and dogs, albeit without success at the moment. The institution has also confirmed that the women do not match any of the four charred bodies found in a truck bound for Reynosa, Tamaulipas, China on February 25, 2023.
The media attention this case has received contrasts with that of the four young people kidnapped in Matamoros. Shaeed Woodard, Zindell Brown, Eric Williams and Latavia Washington McGee were driving from Brownsville to Mexico on March 3 and were intercepted just a few hours later by organized crime operatives who shot them and took them away in a pickup truck. When the FBI announced that they were US citizens and offered a $50,000 reward for information on their whereabouts, the entire Mexican machinery began to work. US pressure worked and in less than 48 hours they located the youths in a wooden shack near the Baghdad beach. Woodard and Brown had died, although the official cause of death has not yet been released. Williams had been shot three times in the legs and McGee was unharmed. “We will not rest until those responsible are brought to justice,” said Ambassador Ken Salazar.
This case came close to sparking a diplomatic conflict between Mexico and the United States, even prompting Republican congressmen to request US Army entry into Mexico, which was categorically denied by Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s administration. As the political noise continues, there is no news from Maritza, Marina and Dora Alicia. In Mexico, seven women go missing every day.
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